The President of the Hellenic Republic, His Excellency Mr. Prokopis Pavlopoulos, and the Minister of National Defence Mr. Panos Kammenos, representing the Government and accompanied by the Chief of HNGS Vice Admiral Evangelos Apostolakis HN, attended today, Saturday August 15 2015, the celebration for the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary and the anniversary for the torpedoing of the Greek cruiser “Elli” which took place in Tinos island.
On Friday, August 14 2015, they attended the Great Festal Hierarchal Vespers at the Holy Church of Panayia Ekatontapiliani in Paros.
The Minister of National Defence made the following address from Tinos Island:
“The Greek people, the country’s Armed Forces, Police and Coast Guard, we are all here so as to honour Her Holy Grace who is also our Champion Leader. Her Holy Grace is the hope for us all, for our families; She is the hope for those who are ill, for those who suffer, for those who are in need, who live in poverty, who experience unemployment. She is the hope best described in the Salutations to the Virgin Mary, which prove that miracles can happen.
We are here, with the country’s first citizen, His Excellency the President of the Hellenic Republic, who represents the people’s unity and embodies the Armed Forces’ leader. He honoured us by coming here in Tinos at sunrise, after paying his respects to the church of Ekatontapiliani at Paros Island, with the frigate “Elli” which bears the name of the glorious vessel that was torpedoed on August 15 1940, before the Virgin Mary’s eyes, here at the shrine of Her Holy Grace, and marked the beginning of World War II for Greece. Yet, at the same time, it marked the hope of a nation who, whenever it fought the mightier that attempted to subdue it and steal its national sovereignty and dignity, albeit smaller, it won thanks to its deep faith to Orthodoxy, to the Virgin Mary, but also to our Armed Forces’ bravery.
Our Armed Forces, which are comprised of the permanent personnel, represented here by the Chief of the Hellenic Navy, but also by the conscripts, the Greek youth who, whenever needed, they will fight by Her Holy Grace’s blessings and win.
Reverend, we kneel before you, before the Holy Fathers, with the hope that this year’s August 15th will be the beginning of a new course for our country. This morning, the news is good and I hope that, with the Virgin Mary’s blessing, we will overcome the past years’ difficult circumstance which the new order, and those who wanted to strike our flags and eliminate our religious symbols, has brought on our country. I wish that globalisation – which wishes for the nations to stop existing, for the religions to stop stirring the people, which wants to convert people to numbers – will be defeated on the day of the Virgin Mary’s celebration, and the Greek people will progress; that all families will deal with the huge problems they encounter, created by the current crisis, and that we will go to an era of prosperity and unity for the Greek people, under the shelter of the Virgin Mary, our Mother, our Champion Leader.
We pay our respects and ask for your blessing and the blessing of Her Holy Grace, particularly for the Armed Forces which currently, in peacetime, fight their own struggle. The aircrafts which flew over us belong to the Hellenic Air Force. They are the aircrafts which fight over the Aegean Sea for our national sovereignty and intercept those who infringe our national airspace. The personnel of the Hellenic Navy, on the frigate “Elli, but also on the missile torpedo boat “Starakis”, on the LST “Rodos”, on the tug “TITAN” but also the entire Hellenic Navy, as well as the Army, the soldiers who serve from Evros to the Greek islands, protect from all threats and ask for the protection of our Champion Leader. May we have your blessing”.
